Crazy Soup is leftover bits of savories from our dinners. Some onions browned in bacon fat, bits of ground beef and onion from forming hamburgers, liquid and trimmings from "juicing" canned tomatoes, canned vegetable liquid, liquid from thawed spinach, broken pieces of dried-out tortilla, a spoonful or two of different cooked veggies, and an extra container of some sort of "meat" gravy.
After each night's dinner, if there's not really enough of anything leftover for a portion, I scoop whatever remains of dinner into a quart-sized container that I keep in the freezer. When I have 2 of these containers, I thaw them, dump into a stock-pot and add some cooked beans. Sometimes I need to amend the seasonings. This time, it was flavorful enough to simmer it until thickened, and add a pinch of salt. And that's our Crazy Soup!
The multi-fruity pie began as a plum pie, with frozen plums. I found some over-candied orange peel, the liquid from thawed, frozen strawberries (from last weekends brunch), and about a cup of leftover rhubarb sauce that no one seemed interested in. I added all of these found ingredients to the plums. Then sprinkled with a mixture of sugar, flour and pinch of baking soda, and tossed it all together right in the pie shell. The pie was absolutely delicious -- however kinda soupy. It could have used more flour in the mixture.
Much of what went into last night's dinner were scraps that might have otherwise been tossed. So, it feels like the dinner was almost "free". (And I could tell the dinner impressed my family. One member had a smile on his face when talking about what might have just been tossed, but was turned into a full meal for our family.)
I was very tired from a busy weekend, and this was just the sort of dinner I felt up to pulling together. True, not gourmet, but still good enough. And sometimes, good enough, is "good enough".
Maybe tonight I'll have more energy to make a "real" meal.
(The bonus with a dinner like last night's -- I was able to empty a bunch of containers from the fridge and freezer!)
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